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How To Successfully Direct Your Focus

Your level of focus is positively correlated to your level of productivity. The more laser focus you possess, the more you will get done. Simple right?

Although this is very simple indeed, the way to acquire laser focus is a tad bit more complex.

Laser focus is becoming harder and harder to perfect due to the nature of our world. Distractions are everywhere, from the apps on your smartphone to mental distractions that ruin your train of thought.

It’s obvious that the key to gaining laser focus is by eliminating the distractions so I won’t bore you with paragraph after paragraph explaining why because this is common sense.

What I want to focus on is another type of problem.

This problem is the issue of a lack of mental focus.

A lack of mental focus often arises when we have too much to do.

What is a lack of mental focus?

In it’s simplest form, a lack of mental focus involves a person that is trying to accomplish one task however their mind is always worrying about the next task at hand.

It’s very difficult to shut off our mind and direct it to the task at hand. Therefore what the average person tends to do is put up a mediocre effort while jumping from task to task. The person becomes accustomed to getting things done. Hence they quickly race through each task on their to do list.

This used to happen to me all the time.

I would be so stressed out that I found myself doing things just for the sake of doing them. I would jump from task to task without really putting my all into any task. My mind was always a step ahead and hence was never really fully present so I couldn’t use it at the task at hand.

This is the farthest thing from laser focus and is obviously not where you want to be.

With that stated, lets focus on some solutions. Solutions that I have used myself to clear up my mind and in return direct my mental focus solely on the task at hand.

How To Successfully Direct Your Focus

1. Take on a quality over quantity approach

One thing that I found out that helps a lot is taking on a quality over quantity approach. I know this sounds very simple, but it truly works.

In today’s time it seems as if people are just concerned with checking off as many tasks off their TO DO lists as possible. In fact I think society should be blamed for this. People have begun to associate working hard with working fast and this is simply not the case.

The number of tasks you complete in a day do not measure how hard you have worked. Therefore you need to get this notion out of your head. You need to stop trying to accomplish everything on your TO DO list.

I find that this really helped me acquire direct focus. The reason is simple, your mind becomes fixated solely on the task at hand the moment you stop trying to tick off everything.

Your mind stops stressing itself out regarding everything on your to do list and just begins to focus on what you are currently working on.

If you can achieve this, you are on your way.

There are also some more simple solutions you can use in order to acquire laser focus.

2. Make a commitment to only move on once you have given it your all

Refuse to jump to another task if you feel as if you haven’t given it your all.

Only move on when you know that you have done your best. Sure this may result in you taking much longer to tick off the tasks on your list, but the quality in which you complete your tasks will be far greater and this will pay off.

What this accomplishes is it prompts you from jumping task to task.

A hidden advantage of this is it will characterize your actions with a sense of excellence. Soon you’ll find yourself with the habit of excellence and this is a very powerful habit.

3. Meditate

Photo courtesy of smithsonianmag.com

This solution really works. Meditation may seem a bit weird, I know it seemed weird to me at first, but once you muster down and make the commitment to meditate you will find yourself with a rich and clear mind. It truly works wonders. Meditation will show you first hand what it takes to direct your focus. The key to mediation is to possess a mind free of any thoughts while being in a relaxed state. Simply focus on your breathing. Mediation reduces all the clutter are mind becomes filled with.

I recommend that you mediate for at least ten minutes a day. You will feel free. Trust me. Just try it.

Those are the three solutions that I have utilized myself. I find that they work, however they depend on you. Laser focus is something that obviously possesses a lot of advantages and is something that success requires so it’s worth your time and effort.

I used the TO DO list example continuously throughout this article, however these solutions work for anything in life that involves focus.

I recommend you experiment a little and see what works for you. The important thing is you take some sort of action. If you read this and didn’t use any of the solutions, you were just reading for the sake of reading. You need to break out of this state.